Philosophy

Philosophy is a various and contested discipline, about which we can and should ask metaphilosophical questions: What is philosophy? How ought we to go about doing it? What is its purpose or value? What kinds of knowledge does it produce? What is the relation between it and other disciplines, e.g. literary criticism, history, psychology? Or between it and other forms of writing, e.g. poetry, fiction, political rhetoric? Is philosophy as currently practiced in Anglo-American universities problematically Western or male? Is university philosophy real philosophy?

The aims of this module are (1) to give you a taste of some of the topics and approaches of contemporary professional philosophy as done here at Lancaster, and (2) to help you to reflect on metaphilosophical questions, both in the discipline and in your own practice.

This module will usually comprise of three parts:

• short talks by philosophy staff on their current research and on the metaphilosophical issues it raises, followed by moderated discussion.
• close reading and discussion of some significant published work in the discipline
• work and presentation on essays in progress.

This module provides you with the opportunity to explore a number of contemporary debates in the philosophy of mental disorder. Topics will vary from year to year, and has included explorations of the following:

• What is mental disorder?
• What is the relationship between evolutionary dysfunction and disorder?
• Are disorders necessarily harmful?
• Antipsychiatry/ postpsychiatry - Are mental disorders substantially like physical disorders? Or, do diagnoses of "mental disorder" simply label behaviour that is unusual, socially stigmatised, or bad?
• Classification - Are mental disorders "natural kinds"? To what extent are values involved in the construction of psychiatric classifications?
• Conceptualising cultural variations - Do mental disorders vary from culture to culture? Would cultural variation mean that a disorder is less "real"?
• Realism and constructionism about mental disorder - What does it mean to say that a disorder is real or constructed?
• Meaning and the limits of reduction - Can symptoms be reduced to faulty brain states? Or, do symptoms such as "delusion" resist reduction?
• Responsibility and disorder - Are those with mental disorders responsible for their actions? Are psychopaths ill or simply evil?
• Identity and mental disorder - Can a disorder be central to someone's identity?
• Values in psychiatric research - In what ways are research in psychiatry value-laden? What are the advantages of user-led research?

The aim of this module is to enable you to develop the skills and virtues of a postgraduate-level philosopher and scholar of philosophy, by guided practice in close reading and reasoned discussion of selected works in moral, political, and social philosophy.

Typically, this module runs as a reading group, where we aim to focus on a small number of high-quality texts that are usually chosen in consultation between the convenor and the group of students taking it each year. In the past, the seminar format has featured a moderated discussion of set reading that has been introduced by a student presentation or by the convenor. Assessment will be by 5,000-word essay on a topic of your choosing, developed in consultation with the convenor.

‘Moral, political, and social philosophy’ will be understood broadly, to cover historical and contemporary philosophical work on a range of topics which may include: modernity, capitalism, liberalism, and alternative possibilities; the nature of human rights; individuality, community, and cultural difference; political authority and the authority of law; nationhood, borders, and cosmopolitanism; human wellbeing; freedom and global unfreedoms; equality and global inequalities; utilitarian, deontological, and virtue ethics; the natures of value, of agency, and of practical rationality.